One embodiment of a food appliance in the form of a breadmaker with coding system has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,704,277. The program-controlled machine operates according to one of a plurality of provided specified programs by receiving materials required in the specified program such as ingredients of a selected kind of bread to be baked.
Breadmakers of the type comprising a baking chamber containing an electric heater at the bottom, a baking pan which is a container to be set inside the baking chamber for receiving ingredients therein, a stirrer for stirring and kneading the ingredients inside the baking pan and a motor for rotating the stirrer in a specified manner, have been known.
Breadmakers of the type storing a plurality of programs and allowing a user to select one of them for baking a desired kind of bread have also been known. These programs generally include many complicated steps such as mixing selected ingredients and controlling the baking temperature. With some prior art breadmakers, the user is required to read a cookbook carefully to ascertain the necessary steps before setting an appropriate program.
Some breadmakers are preprogrammed, and the user has only to specify the desired kind of bread to be baked, the breadmaker automatically carrying out the program associated with the specified kind of bread.
For allowing the user to specify the kind of bread to be baked, some breadmakers are designed to display, as power is switched on, the types of bread that can be specified. An indicator is initially displayed at a default position, say, next to the name of the most commonly selected kind of bread, and the user operates a SELECT button until the indicator moves one position at a time to finally reach a position next to the desired kind of bread.
Alternatively, the breadmaker may be provided with as many push buttons as the number of different kinds of bread that can be baked thereby, and the user is required to push the button corresponding to the desired kind of bread. With prior art breadmakers, therefore, the number of programs from which the user can select one is limited because the screen of the display device is not large and the control panel of the machine cannot accommodate too many buttons.
With prior art breadmakers, furthermore, the user must carefully add the required ingredients such as flour, sugar, salt and yeast. In other words, prior art breadmakers are not energy-efficient and are difficult to use and the choice of different kinds of bread that can be baked thereby cannot be increased significantly.
Prior art breadmakers and other program-controlled appliances have a limited set of preset programs they can operate on. That is, the repertoire of programs that can be executed by a breadmaker or a similar appliance is fixed at the factory. If a new recipe calls for a different process, the user can at best approximate it by selecting the closest existing preset program. In most cases, the user will have to purchase newer models of the machine in order to have the newer features and processes.
Furthermore, prior art food processing machines tend to be task-specific and single-purpose. For example, a breadmaker is dedicated to making bread, a rice cooker for cooking rice, a rotisserie for roasting, a regular oven or a microwave oven or a convection oven for either general-purpose or specific kind of baking, toasting and broiling, etc.